Escapade Read Free Page A

whipping boy. He exemplified all that she deplored—vanity, arrogance, conspicuous display of wealth, wasting of time and talents. To this were added two attributes that Thorndyke liked, too: He never threatened to sue, as some did, nor did he ever storm into the office demanding to know who Miss Prattle was; and his name was of lively interest to his readers. Miss Prattle received every encouragement to say what she pleased about him.
    During the time the Twitchwells were after Clare, his intimates teased him about being color-blind, because of his inability to distinguish red hair from blonde. Miss Prattle also took him to task, but she avoided the obvious and hinted instead that it was his color blindness that had led him to appear on the strut in a waistcoat no gentleman of fashion would be caught dead in, and added that it might also account for his book at Tatt's being in the red.
    “Damme, I've missed settling up day at Tatt's,” Clare said when Miss Twitchwell read the article to him.
    “Yes, but it is really a dig at you for not being able to tell me and Alice apart. Everyone says so."
    “And one may always count on you to belabor the obvious, Lady ... Alice, is it?"
    “No, I'm Mary,” she told him, still smiling.
    “And quite contrary,” he said, returning her smile.
    Clare shrugged his elegant shoulders when Miss Prattle ticked him off for betting five hundred pounds that Miss Altmire would not be allowed a voucher to Almack's, and agreed that he ought to have made it a thousand, for it was a dead certainty no mere Cit's daughter would get her toe into the holy of holies. That she had used his name as a reference to Sally Jersey had goaded him into making the bet, but Miss Prattle had slipped up on that piece of business.
    His failure to appear at a garden party tossed at Clare Palace for his friends resulted in the title, “The Great Absent One,” but he merely quirked an eyebrow and said, “Damme, my barber was down with the quinsy; it would have been an insult to attend my own party unshaven.” Miss Prattle retaliated that His Grace had had a closer shave than he realized on that day, but she knew it was untrue and unworthy of her pen. There was nothing this presumptuous lord could do that would turn society against him while he remained the richest single gentleman in England.
    Miss Prattle once wrote an entire column, ostensibly devoted to the general debauchery and low behavior of high society, but sprinkled throughout with so many references to the D—e of C—e that she deceived no one, least of all the Duke. Though he put a bland face on it, it angered Clare that it should be publicly advertised how he had failed to follow up in the House of Lords his efforts to alleviate the lot of those engaged in cottage industry, who were losing their livelihood by the introduction of mechanization. It hurt because it was true; he was well aware that he had not put forth his best efforts. Had only made the speech to support Byron—it did not affect his own county—and when George had let it go, he too had forgotten it. He felt the rest—the money spent on gambling and horses—was mere nit-picking, but the slur on his sloth and disinterest spurred him, and he had resumed his activities in the House. Miss Prattle had made no mention of that, he observed to himself.
    He was chatting one day in his study with Bippy Tredwell, an intimate friend, and the subject of Miss Prattle arose.
    “The woman's turning serious on us,” Bippy offered. “A regular tirade she's come up with today."
    “Yes, and she's becoming a dead bore as well,” Clare agreed. For three years he had been listening to people tell him what she had said about him in her latest piece. “I would dearly like to know who this curst Prattle might be."
    “Might be anyone,” Bippy surmised.
    “Or everyone. She reports simultaneously on the dos in London, and in the country, and at Brighton. Seems to know Prinney and his set pretty well,